


Perspective

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Artist Castiel (Supernatural), Beaches, Day At The Beach, Dean is Smooth AF, First Meetings, Fluff, Humor, Light Angst, Local Dean, M/M, Painting, Summer, Surfer Dean Winchester, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Yes I'm Aware It's Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-28 13:23:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16724232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: “Are you sure? I don’t want to intrude…”“I’m out here all day on the weekends anyway,” Dean says, shrugging. “Besides, I could use a wingman. ’M telling you, this ocean, if you let her, she’ll swallow you whole.”Castiel narrows his eyes, but not without an amused smile. “Isn’t that the point of surfing?”Dean smirks. “You’re catching on already, Cas.”





	Perspective

**Author's Note:**

> Based on my very real writer's block these past few weeks.

There’s always something so calming about the beach despite its enigmatic enormity.

Then again, it’s all about perspective.

A throng of people are on the beach, behind the waves.

Few are inside them.

And others are so far out, they’re living in tomorrow.

Maybe the ocean thins out for a reason. No one wants to see into tomorrow, and surely those who are in it don’t want to remember yesterday.

But the ocean isn’t so thin in the thick of it. As if fighting to get away from the shore wasn’t hard enough, southbound winds stir the sleeping waters near the rising sun, creating a giant tidal offspring intent on swallowing its guests.

However, despite its menacing shadow hand, the future doesn’t give people obstacles: We do. In the same way the wind excites the ocean, our thoughts excite worry. This is the same reason the shore spits rocks and shells at people swimming too close to the sand: The past will remind someone they’re wading too close for comfort.

And sometimes, it takes another force of nature to drive that message home for Castiel.

“Oh shit, man. I am so sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

While the man scrambles to recover the stand, Castiel uses his canvas to block out the sun. After a few more seconds of gathering his supplies, it disappears behind something tall and thin. It isn’t until he looks up that Castiel realizes the guy’s propped up his surfing board. He bends down next to Castiel, trying to help put his pastels back in their respective slots. Of course, they only get runnier from his wet hands, and they’re all out of color sequence, but now that he can see him clearer, Castiel doesn’t care.

“Hopefully I didn’t mess it up,” he continues, shaking his mop of shoulder-length caramel hair until a bit of faded blue pokes through, “I’d hate to have you start over, especially since the sky’s never—”

“The same color for more than a few seconds.” Castiel smiles. “Right.”

The man gestures to Castiel’s overturned painting. “So you’re like Bob Ross?”

“Hmm? O-oh. Kind of. I prefer oils to acrylics because they tend to be less…” Castiel takes in the man’s emerald green eyes, drifting faster than the waves licking the shore and surrounding his bare feet. Around his right ankle is a gold pendent that temporarily blinds him back to reality. “I guess you could say I believe in happy accidents.”

Blushing—at least that’s what Castiel will tell himself in his motel tonight if that pick-up line doesn’t work out, the man loans his right hand. “Dean.”

“Castiel,” he replies, latching onto it.

“Castiel. That’s not as TV-friendly as Bob.”

“No wonder I haven’t found commercial success.”

Dean shoots him a perched brow before splitting into a grin. With his face alight with joy, the freckles around his crinkled nose stand out. The sight’s comparable—rivaled, even—to a lighthouse exposing every scattered ship on the ocean tide. “You’re funny, Cas.”

“Now if only I could put it to good use.”

“What do you mean? You’re making me laugh.”

Castiel smiles softly. “Well, that’s good. I don’t know, I’ve just been in a bit of a block lately with my art. I came here, to California, to clear my head, but I feel even more stuck.”

“Mm, tell you what.” Dean plops himself onto Castiel’s disheveled towel. “How about you join me here tonight around six? The sun sets around that time, so you’ll be able to flex your color game.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to intrude…”

“I’m out here all day on the weekends anyway,” Dean says, shrugging. “Besides, I could use a wingman. ’M telling you, this ocean, if you let her, she’ll swallow you whole.”

Castiel narrows his eyes, but not without an amused smile. “Isn’t that the point of surfing?”

Dean smirks. “You’re catching on already, Cas.”

 

~o~

The beach is quieter around this time. No birds cooing in the distance. No competition between the waves. Just the soft crunch of sand beneath Castiel’s black converse and the gentle caress of wind against his cheeks.

Without a second glance, he sets up his supplies and starts painting. Except… well, that’s the thing about artist’s block. He’s painting, but he’s not sure if he’s creating anything: It closer resembles deliberate lines than a free, collective piece.

It also feels as if he’s painted this before. Not like Deja vu, just a general repetitiveness to his art. And in his life. Where pattern and routine can be beneficial, it can also wreak havoc when it’s broken.

“Hey.”

Castiel jumps a little. “Hey. You scared me.”

Instead of his wetsuit, Dean’s stripped down to a pair of red swim trucks. Not that it’s an unwelcome sight… far from it, actually. Dean himself is worthy of his own Mona Lisa. The setting sun adds a bronze to a beige palette, emphasizing muscles running from his pectorals to his sharp hipbones, and shading every dip in-between. But… “I thought you said we were going to watch the sunset.”

“We are,” reassures Dean, nodding towards the water. Castiel swears the wave that jumps up waves back at him. “From the ocean.”

Castiel drops his head. “You’re joking.”

Dean just shrugs.

“I didn’t even bring my swimsuit—I don’t even have a board!”

“That’s why I brought you one.”

“I can’t swim!” Castiel continues, praying some excuse will stick, “I’ll drown!”

“Oh please, with eyes like those, I’m sure people drown all the time.” Dean winks, leaving Castiel no choice but to catch the board coming at him. “Surf’s up!”

 

 

 

“Don’t you ever get lonely out here?”

Dean turns to Castiel as if he asked him about the definition of patriotism. “Cas, look in front of you.”

Castiel does. It’s a breath-taking sight not even Thomas Kinkade can recreate for dime a dozen Christmas cards. It’s as if the roles of the universe are reversed: As if someone placed a straw in the middle of the ocean and sucked out all the moisture,—along with the colors, now seen spit out in hues of blue and purple and yellow across the sky—turning the water to thick, foamy, cold brew clouds sidling towards the shore. And to feel it all happening beneath him—reminding him in subtle, soothing rocking motions—makes him feel part of, rather than separate from the change.

They sit in silence, letting their legs submerge deeper with every thrust of the ocean’s rhythmic pull. Breathing in the salt. Letting the soft wind dry their respective hairs and hum a shop tune in their ears.

“That pendant on your leg,” Castiel chimes, sounding like a siren blaring full-force in a sleepy neighborhood, “what does it mean?”

Dean looks down with a small smile. “My brother gave it to me when we were kids. Found it again when he left for Stanford last year. It’s been a weird anchor for me—especially when I tend to get lost out here.”

“That’s how I feel when I paint,” Castiel says before rolling his eyes. “Or, at least, I used to. I lost my job recently. It’s not like I loved it or anything, but it gave me a sense of familiarity. I’d go from work to my studio, my studio to sleep, and back to work—and I thrived off that routine, creatively and at work. It motivated me to work harder and faster to get out earlier, because I knew I’d come home to a half-finished canvas. But now that I’m unemployed…”

“You have too _much_ time to do anything you want,” Dean finishes, nodding. “Yeah, I know the feeling.”

“That’s why you live in the present.”

“Hmm?”

“I mean, that’s why you surf. So you’re forced to focus on what’s coming at you now, rather than reliving your brother’s decision to go to college and what it’ll mean for you guys later.” Castiel chuckles to himself and glances down at his hands. They’re coated in pastel, but they look more like stains from holding skittles too long in the palms of his hands. It’s even somehow on his underwear. “Just as much as I needed to be out here, not thinking, not planning every stroke of life—feeling my muse rather than spitting it out onto a canvas. Thank you for this.”

“’s no trouble,” replies Dean, nudging Castiel’s shoulder. “Besides, you’re good company. Even if you don’t know how to sit on a surfboard.”

Castiel blinks a few times as he glances around him. “What? I feel perfectly fine.”

“Cas, you’re hunched over the board like Quasimodo riding a spin bike. Look…”

Dean reaches over with his right hand. To no avail, he pries Castiel’s stubborn hands from the edge of the board. Castiel thinks he’s given up before he nearly canons from the weight of another person behind him. “What the—?”

Castiel stiffens at the new contact at first. Then, remembering it’s just Dean, relaxes into his chest, hands falling with him. He smells like salt and sunscreen. Like summer.

Like freedom.

“How much longer are you here?” he asks. Castiel can’t tell if that’s him talking in his ear or the steady wind. They’ve become so intertwined with nature, and each other.

“I head out Monday morning,” he replies, voice barely registering above a whisper.

“Well,” says Dean, drawing goosebumps on Castiel’s skin when he wraps his arms around his middle, “let’s make sure you’ll never need a reference photo for this again.”

 

 

 


End file.
